hwycine Reviews

IP5: The Island of Pachyderms (1992)

Worthy Of A New Theatrical Release!

[15 January 2007]

I saw this at the 1991 Seattle film fest and never heard of it being in cinemas in the US. I should think it would do very well even now. Imagine getting the whole graffiti artist, skater crowd to come to see a French film! They would. Even the title would attract a lot of the hip-hop culture, IP5, sounds pretty contemporary to me! Build it and they will indeed come.

Wonderful film: the production design, dialog, the cinematography & casting are all very, very good. Perhaps this film toured the American college film program circuit in 16mm, not sure. This film really needs to be on DVD so that more people can see it. I imagine the politics & money thing are the reasons it didn't make the natural leap from VHS to DVD.

Scream of Stone (1991)

Powerful Film, Well Worth Seeing

[10/10 · 15 January 2007]

I saw this at the Seattle International Film Festival in 1991 and was very impressed. I was so surprised that it wasn't in American cinemas soon after. I now have read about the huge price Werner & his people were asking for it. Sometimes distribution issues can kill a film from being seen, and it is us, the audience who gets cheated.

Perhaps Werner could have toured the film in the same way that Warren Miller does his ski films. Warren never fails to get that $12 to $15 per ticket, and he doesn't have to worry about popcorn sales.

I'd love to see a fresh print of this film released theatrically in 2007 and tour the country. Are you reading this Landmark Theaters?

Happenstance (2000)

Lovely little films like this never get the attention they deserve.

[10/10 · 15 January 2007]

In my years of attending film festivals, I have seen many little films like this that never get theatrical distribution, and they end up in the $3 bins at WalMart. I just found DVD of Yank Tanks there, great doc, but how sad for it to end up as a rock-bottom remainder.

I loved this film, wish I'd seen it at the cinema in it's everything. I'd have preferred that New Yorker Films had translated the title directly. It's good for Americans to stretch a little. If the film's title helps the US audience to explore random chaos, all the better. Cinema imitates life & visa versa.

Also, I found it distracting that the subtitles put prices in dollars. Come on! The euro is not hard to figure out, make the gringo audiences do the math. Seeing a film, especially one shot in Paris, the viewer should not have the effect spoiled by being reminded: I am an American watching a movie and they are translating the Euros into dollars for me.

Looking forward to seeing more of these actors and more from the writer & director as well.